NGD - Purpleburst Headless - Grote (Pic Heavy)

Just done my first restring. The set was the Ernie ball baritone 72-13 6 string set.
Tuned it to Drop G#
Basically how the bridge works for restrings is you stab the string down in a hole in each spindle exactly like how you would when you restring a bass, then you just wind it up until its wrapped around a few times.

Getting a locking headpiece for this a must!!!!!. Im so glad I did. Its made restring it a breeze tbh.
Will do some tone stuff soon \m/

Also with thicker strings on, its made adjusting the action easier somehow. The thicker string seems to hold the bridge in place better too. It buzzes less and feels more secure.

I did have to unwind the outer string layers on the first 2 strings (72 and 54 I believe) as they were too thick to stick in. I also had to unwind a little on the 72 at the headpiece end for it to fit in the nut slot. Locking headpiece made doing this not a problem.

Also............ It seems that cleaning the fretboard takes black off?.
So Im basically assuming this is rosewood and they ebonized it for the $25 then claimed it was "ebony"?
No other reason why Ebony would strip its black right?. Its still dark dark but It did leave black on my rag.
Haha.

If it's still black underneath, then it might be fine. Did you use any oil or anything to clean, or is it just wiping off dry? It might just be some sort of gunk, but it's equally possible that dye was used. Ultimately, though, if the material holds up, looks good, and sounds good, it shouldn't matter what it is unless you need to tell someone in customs what it is, which is why I think there might be a higher possibility it's old stock rosewood dyed black to get through customs.

I know what my finger gunk looks like. This was legit "black" on the rag. So yeah Im guessing dye. But if its still ebony thats been dyed then yeah who cares.

I will only care if its rosewood and genuinely starts going light brown after time as I HATE that look on guitars personally. Otherwise yeah Im not that bothered what the board is made from. I guess though if you pay extra for Ebony, you expect it to actually be Ebony.... Hopefully it is haha.

I'm not saying finger gunk. Every guitar I've bought from any of the developing economies or China has had black gunk on it the first time I cleaned the fretboard. I think it's some sort of grease they use to make the frets or to slide the frets into their slots or something. It's not an ebony thing in my case, because I never bought any ebony fretboard guitars of this nature. After the first cleaning, I sometimes see it a little bit on the second cleaning, but then once it's gone it's gone.

I'm not saying finger gunk. Every guitar I've bought from any of the developing economies or China has had black gunk on it the first time I cleaned the fretboard. I think it's some sort of grease they use to make the frets or to slide the frets into their slots or something. It's not an ebony thing in my case, because I never bought any ebony fretboard guitars of this nature. After the first cleaning, I sometimes see it a little bit on the second cleaning, but then once it's gone it's gone.

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Ah i see what you mean!.

Ah ok well lets hope its just that then.
I will update my findings on the next couple of restrings in the future.

Looking forward to my daughter being in bed so I can get the Kemper setup and try this out in my normal tuning!

(Not to be a dick, because we all make choices with our money. But they are choices.)

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sigh...

Already explained this before.
Its the first and last time ive ever been able to buy something worth more than £600 (and even this £600 was thanks to loads of trade ins for money off) (I also dont drive so have never had Car expenses etc)

most of the money I had for the kemper (about £950) was obtained/saved through still living with family with barely any outgoings before I even met my partner, and selling lots of gear and was also before my first daughter arrived obv.
Since then I have become the main provider in the household with my partner and have another child due Jan 2nd.

So sick of this sort of thing being aimed at me.
In 10 years of being a guitarist, the kemper is the first and only time I have ever and will ever be able to spend money like this. Period.

Dont you think If I could afford to, I would be buying Kiesels or high end custom guitars over importing some cheap no name model from China ffs?
My latest guitar was the Harley Benton fan fret 6 string. Cost me £200 incl shipping and was B stock.

Just came to say that when I bought my BC Rich JrV Deluxe that had an ebony fretboard it was dyed black(er) as it would leave black dye on my fingers for a while and on the first few restrings on the rag when I would clean it with lemon oil. It became slightly lighter all over the fretboard but was still quite quite dark. Just not as super dark, glossy and shiny as I first bought it. So it might just be that, ebony that wasn't uniformly black and they dyed it to give it that extra blackness.

I think there are a few of us on this board in the same boat. Kids and family and whatnot is expensive. To put into perspective, I drive a car that cost about £370, I mostly eat canned beans and frozen off-brand vegetables, and my kids don't eat expensive food, either, but overall, our groceries cost £105/week, significantly less than average in our area, but still, school costs, car insurance, taxes, etc., add up to about 80-90% of my household income (as I am the only one in the house with a job). The other 10-20% goes into the bank for a rainy day fund, which gets drained faster than I can put money into it.

My last gear purchases were used Rondo instruments, which I could hardly afford. Yet, buying domestically available used stuff from people on the board was significantly more secure than purchasing from a shady overseas builder. You almost didn't get your guitar at all, thanks to ParcelForce (who tried to use the fact that this was an international shipment as an excuse), and now that you have it, you've needed to perform a couple repairs already just to keep it working. Anyway, if I had the financial security to do so, I would have absolutely hired a luthier to build me a guitar made-to-order to meet the goals of my project. Instead, I took the cheap route and bought budget guitars and had them modified to spec. I was even morally conflicted in doing so, since I was purchasing a guitar that was a generic design and a bass that was an obvious homage to Dingwall, even if the body style and features were entirely different.

So, I hear your struggle, and I think I can say I understand. I think that different folks draw the line in the proverbial sand and say this is okay and this is not okay. I'm personally honestly relieved that your guitar eventually made it into your hands with only a handful of surmountable issues. @Hollowway is a great guy, who is really trying to do some original things. I think that on a visceral level, people like that tend to value originality and novelty a lot more than what other people would consider financial necessities to fit things into budget and still get basic groundwork done. That's why, as a guy who is more broke than probably 99%+ of the forum, but also someone who greatly values intellectual originality, I think I can see both sides of this, and I don't see a way around the conflict between these sets of values, but it still pains me to see people fighting over this.

Has the potential to come off a number of ways. I get that you're asserting your appreciation for the work of the builder, but on the other hand, there are a lot of nuances of the statement that reflect negatively. On a basic level, you are saying you wish you could support this company, but their prices are too high for you. Imagine someone said that to you about something you worked on. Maybe you release an album, and someone comes up to you at a show and asks you to sign the album, but it's a photocopy of your cover. Then the person tell you that they would love to support your band, but $9.99 was just too much to spend on an album, so they bought a CD-R and had their friend print the cover off of google images. Now imagine that this person is one of hundred of people doing the same thing, and not at all ashamed about doing so, so your band, although very popular, isn't making money. How would that make you feel?

Nothing personal against you, I just feel it's worth pointing out that the above is a pretty good example of a "trigger" statement.